Chapter 2

After years in office, Shen Shi’an guarded his reputation jealously.

He would not lightly cast off the wife who had shared his poverty. Now that I was asking to leave, we had finally found something we could agree on.

What I hadn’t expected was that the people most upset by our divorce would be his two bedchamber maids.

One was called Juqing, the other Lanxiang. Both wept and sobbed.

“We’ll never find another mistress so generous,” they said. “If only we didn’t have our children to think of, we’d go with you, Sister Miaomiao.”

I gave a couple of awkward laughs. “Don’t mock me like that. I’m really the least generous person there is.”

The Xus were wealthy, and I had brought a substantial dowry.

Of its two finest sets of jewelry, I left the jade set to Juqing and the gemstone set to Lanxiang.

I packed the rest overnight. At first light, I left the Shen household with three carriages.

I had come with my family and household, and now I was leaving all alone.

The city gate dwindled to a black speck behind me. Hooves threw up yellow sand. Dust blew into my eyes, and by the time I had rubbed them twice, even that speck was gone.

Qingzhou, Qingzhou. After all those years, Yipinxian was still Yipinxian, but the boy who had written letters beneath it was long gone.

My father, dark and plump, his belly round as a watermelon, was already waiting outside with a box of the bean candy I had loved as a child.

“You’ll find loyalty among butchers and faithlessness among scholars. I told you Shen Shi’an wasn’t a good match. All that matters is that you’re home.”

Keeping an arm around me, he took me upstairs, pushed open a small window, and announced with the excitement of a man unveiling a treasure, “Look! The empire your father has built for you!”

The street below teemed with people. A few mischievous children chased about, hawkers’ cries rose one after another, and gardenia fragrance from the rouge shop drifted on the wind and tickled my nose.

Father looked at me expectantly. “Well?”

“Very lively.”

“And?”

“…Very full of everyday life?”

He gave my head a hearty slap.

“Silly girl! This whole street belongs to the Xus! Your father can keep you for the rest of your life!”

What?

When I first married, I had consoled him by saying that with Shen Shi’an as my husband, Yipinxian would have branches all over the capital.

Later, once Shen Shi’an held power, so many people wanted to curry favor with him that their only difficulty was finding an opening. To avoid any appearance of impropriety, the restaurant plans had been abandoned.

Who would have thought Father had quietly earned himself an entire street?

I was touched, but a little sad too.

Yipinxian had never made it to the capital after all.

When I did the sums, I had lost eight years of my youth and two sets of jewelry.

I pressed my handkerchief to my eyes.

Well. What a turn of events.

Back as the Xu family’s young mistress, I had only three things to do each day.

Eat, play, sleep.

Father complained that Shen Shi’an had let me grow too thin.

It had been years since anyone had cherished me, so this time I obediently did as I was told.

I ate to my heart’s content, enjoyed myself to my heart’s content, and slept to my heart’s content.

After two months, I was finally beginning to feel alive again. I loosened the sash I had grown too plump for, picked up a fan, and went to find Father.

Yipinxian was as busy as ever, but that day it was livelier than usual.

From a distance I could see a crowd outside. Two men in black stood out: Ah Da and Ah Er, the restaurant’s hired muscle. They rarely appeared unless a customer was causing trouble.

Ah Da, being tall, saw me first. He hurried forward to hide what lay on the ground behind him.

“Nothing fit for you to see, Miss.”

But there was plainly a drunkard on the ground, along with two half-dead wild geese. How could one Ah Da hide all that?

The man had come to Yipinxian to propose a marriage.

As for whom he meant to marry…

I lifted my skirt a little and walked across the drunkard’s body.

Oh dear. Rather hard underfoot. How very wicked of me.

In a room off the rear courtyard, broken teacups littered the floor. Father was stamping about in a fury.

Since I had come home divorced, matchmakers had nearly worn through our doorstep. Now they were even making a nuisance of themselves at Yipinxian.

Marrying a woman who had already been married wasn’t considered especially respectable, yet I was remarkably sought after.

The reason was simple: the Xus had a large fortune and only one daughter.

That daughter had borne no child in eight years. If she married again, she would probably still have trouble conceiving. But someone had to inherit Yipinxian.

Take a few concubines, have a few children, and wouldn’t Yipinxian, together with the whole street, fall under the new son-in-law’s control?

Their calculations for swallowing a family with no male heir were practically clicking in our faces. Father was green with rage. He cursed the wickedness of human hearts and the coldness of the world. Every manner of devil and monster dared set his sights on his precious girl!

I patted his back to soothe him. “A few petty villains aren’t worth making yourself ill over. Besides, they’re our neighbors. We can’t avoid them forever. There’s no need to make this so ugly. It’s easy enough to settle.”

“Oh?”

“Your daughter already has someone she loves. Naturally, I must wait for him to marry me. How could I marry anyone else? You can turn away all those old friends and uncles with perfect courtesy.”

His eyes brightened. After a moment’s careful thought, he laughed and called me a cunning little thing.

Within a fortnight, all Qingzhou knew the divorced young mistress of the Xu family had a beloved she refused to marry without.

On her journey home, she had wandered into a murderous roadside inn and been saved by a remarkable man.

He was eight chi tall, handsome, and extraordinarily skilled.

She had fallen in love at first sight and vowed to marry no one else.

Even if she were to marry another man, she must first see her beloved again and put that longing to rest.

As for his name, they had met only by chance, and she hadn’t managed to ask. All she remembered was that he carried a sword with a dark green tassel on its hilt.

Of his looks she remembered a little red mole beneath his lashes, strong brows and bright eyes, and another small mole on the palm of his right hand.

Many wandering martial artists carried swords. Few had a mole beneath their lashes and another on their palm. That would make him difficult to impersonate.

Since he had passed through Qingzhou on business, he would probably pass through it again on his way back.

The young mistress would wait.

Wait to see him once more.

Once the story spread, the endless marriage proposals finally stopped. Peace returned to my ears, and I gnawed on braised pork hocks every day.

Three or five days later, I had hired an opera troupe to perform at home when Ah He, the gatekeeper, came running in, breathless.

He shouted as he ran.

“We’ve found him! We’ve found him!”

I passed him a cup from the table. “Found what?”

He swallowed the hot tea, finally caught his breath, and said happily, “Miss, we’ve found the man who saved your life! They’ve carried him right to the gate!”

Thump!

The pork hock I had been raising to my mouth fell.